Another E3 has come and gone and the Tabula Rasa team comes home satisfied, enthusiastic, determined, energized and exhausted all in one. We spent three days showing the game to colleagues, press, and buyers and we feel that we have a great game on our hands. Those of us who didn’t make it to Los Angeles were in Austin working hard on the game or escorting, in game, the players that were logging on at the E3 floor. Those of us who did make it to Los Angeles participated in one of the best booths at the show. I would like to thank Mutaytor and Chris Vrenna for making our booth experience one of the best at the show.
One of the great things about E3 is watching how people play our game. We were gratified that anyone could get in and play the game without lots of instruction time, and the people that did play said that it felt right. When we made the decision to create an RPG with shooter style controls, we knew that feel was going to be very, very important. So, now we just have to finish polishing the game by making sure it runs well on lots of hardware, getting in the rest of the content and opening up the servers for Friends and Family testing.
So that’s it for this year. My final impression of Tabula Rasa at E3 is this: those that saw the game thought it looked beautiful and intriguing. Those people that played it had lots of fun and often stayed for hours, and that’s all you can ask for. I’ll leave you with some links that tell the story better than I will:
From the E3 Press…
WarCry: NCsoft's E3 line-up hands-on preview – Tabula Rasa
"Tabula Rasa boasts top-notch visuals combined with distinct looks for each planet. Put simply, it's pretty, but not so pretty players can forget there's a war on."
BoomTown: E3 2006: Tabula Rasa Interview
"In Tabula Rasa the war constantly waves back and forth across the planets, shifting the front lines regularly, which means that some areas will open up and others will close off as time progresses."
Killer Betties: E3 2006: 'Tabula Rasa' - Impressions
"TR was described to me as ‘similar to WoW or Guild Wars.’ Well, yeah, if you add the pacing the best first person shooters and the adrenaline of a Rob Zombie concert."
EXE: Hands-on with Tabula Rasa
"...the best feature of Tabula Rasa is the setting, the concept. A Sci-Fi shooter that doesn’t run us down with the common cliché's of rockets and rails, or alien drones and queens."
ActionTrip: Tabula Rasa Hands-on
"The game world is huge and expansive, and in conjunction with the chaotic, war-like feeling of combat, it makes the player feel like they are taking part in something much larger than themselves."
GameSpot: Tabula Rasa Hands-on
"...we couldn't resist the opportunity to get some quality hands-on time with the game on the E3 show floor, and were pleased to find it to be so good-looking and fast paced."
"All in all, I’m impressed by what they had to offer at this point in time. It’s got potential, it’s got polish, and it’s got what seems to be a great team heading up a solid project."
Gamers With Jobs: E3 "Fly-by" of Tabula Rasa
"The most striking thing about Tabula Rasa is probably its art design. It’s looking very atmospheric and intense, with all kinds of interesting and impressive enemies."
YouTubeVideos:
"The game interface looked more like a first-person shooter and combat appeared to be much faster than the usual button-clicking style seen in 'Everquest' or 'World of Warcraft.'"
MMORPG.COM: Tabula Rasa Interview with Starr Long
"Tabula Rasa will also have crafting, but it will be 100% combat oriented. For example, players can harvest ore from rocks, but only to build weapons and armor. Three ways of gathering material are mining, organic harvest and salvage. The later two are gathering from monster remains."
"Graphically, Tabula looks closer to a cutting-edge FPS than your standard MMO (as texture maps and world detail is much higher than is the norm)."
Skewed & Reviewed: Tabula Rasa Interview
"In addition to normal skills like Rifle, Pistol, Armor, Salvage, etc., each character class has a set of Logos powers that are beyond normal human skills. These include things like Lightning, Knockback, and Energy Wave."
GameTrailers.com: NCsoft E3 Booth Tour
TG Daily Audio: Richard Garriott Interview
"While many of the games are polished, with beautiful graphics and storylines, he believes the game play is becoming too repetitive and slow. Integrated voice-chat, like that found in his upcoming Tabula Rasa game, will allow for more exciting and faster game play."